what you can't say
by doroniasobi
Summary: keep your eyes on the road and remember, it's easier than they tell you. — Marui, OC
1. prologue

**notes** for those of you that may be wondering what this is, i'm really sorry but i don't really know. i do not have an explanation to offer. i do not have an explanation, period. what are you doing, doro?! you may be asking. the answer is I DO NOT KNOW. i wish i did, though; it would make my life so much easier. sigh.

**warning** multichap. try not to expect anything, because if you don't expect anything and you get something, it's double the surprise!

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><p><strong>what you can't say;<strong>

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><p>.<p>

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As soon as Marui's spot as a regular on the tennis team was confirmed in middle school, he knew that there wouldn't be many chances to make his own choices. This was especially if he was planning to stick with tennis through high school, too. Everything from how often he practiced to how often he went out with friends would be regulated. For the most part, he didn't mind—but that was because he didn't think about it all that much. He could still watch his weight and have a few slices of cake every now and then. Meetings with friends could be arranged and rearranged once the tennis season was over. It didn't matter too much to Marui; he wasn't the only one suffering, and it wasn't like he had too many friends outside the tennis club to begin with.

But the one thing that started to bug him once he hit high school, was the lack of control over his appearance, his habits. Tennis players, it seemed, were not simply just tennis players. In high school, Rikkai Dai's entire impression revolved around their athletic prowess. Everything began to matter. Professionalism was ironed into their cores. In Marui's first year of high school, their captain buried this into their minds; it was a new mold to fit, and even Sanada struggled to fit it.

Marui's appearance did not mean much to him; he was not a messy person, and generally, he was used to authority. But when Marui's grip on his personal self-image was strained, to him, this mattered the most.

At the end of their first year of high school, he enlists Jackal's help in purchasing a new stick of gum.

"Buchou is not going to like this," Jackal warns him.

"Who cares," Marui scoffs, stepping into the candy aisle. "He's leaving for university in a week. Yukimura's taking over next year, and I never needed his permission for anything."

"He just doesn't like it when you start relying on good luck charms." Jackal holds a roll of gum out to him, but snatches it away when Marui makes to grab it. "He thinks you're holding back your true potential."

"Oh, and he knows _everything_ about me, does he. Tomorrow I'm going to go up to him and ask him what my blood type is. If he gets it right, I'll give him my gum wad as a graduation present."

"Yukimura thinks that too, you know."

Marui frowns.

"He's just nicer about it."

"What, so you're saying you actually prefer buchou over Yukimura?"

"_No_, I'm saying that I think both of their intentions are beneficial for your development. Yukimura, however, doesn't have a stick stuck up his ass."

Marui ignores him, takes the gum Jackal is holding, and pops a piece into his mouth.

"You need to pay for that," Jackal hisses, staring nervously at the security camera.

"I don't have money on me. Pay for me, would you?"

"You're such a pain." Marui flashes a grin at Jackal, who glares at him and makes his way past him and towards the cashier. Marui looks around—there is a small mirror at the end of the aisle. He ambles over to peer curiously into it and almost crashes into someone rounding the corner.

"Sorry," he begins, and then pauses because this person is wearing the same high school uniform as him. "Oh." Upon closer inspection, this person is of the female counterpart of the human species. "Oh," he says again.

She blinks. "Oh," she repeats. Her gaze goes from the packet of gum he is holding in his hand to the gum he is chewing in his mouth. "…Did you pay for that?"

"Negative." He points at Jackal, who is making his way back from the counter. Jackal's eyes widen a little in recognition and he waves in greeting.

"Yo."

Nameless girl waves back, and they start a casual conversation. Not interested in their exchange, Marui turns back around to the mirror he'd been eyeing and blows a bubble, staring at his own reflection. He raises an eyebrow. Raises the other. Pops the bubble. Flicks his hair, because please, every genius knows how to flip their hair.

Jackal and Nameless stop their conversation to stare at Marui in his moment of narcissism.

"Who are you trying to look like?"

Marui turns his head to look at Nameless. Her eyes are wide and she looks genuinely curious. Marui leans back from the mirror and grins. "Myself."

Nameless crosses her arms and grins back. "Cool."

Jackal watches the exchange and smiles to himself, feeling infinitely pleased and infinitely proud.

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	2. 01

**notes **i just kept writing, i hope no one minds. i'm taking full advantage of the first week back to uni where no one really starts learning yet. (read: i have no life.)

**warning** i still have no idea what this is. please stop expecting things. and updates. (i'm looking at you, jabba. and you, fyeri. I'M WATCHING YOU TWO.)

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><p><strong>what you can't say;<br>01.**

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><p>Marui joined the tennis team in middle school initially because his mother insisted he maintain at least some form of a social life. Then he'd dragged Jackal into it because he could. Joining a club was actually a better idea than going out of his way to make friends, because at least when you're associated with a club, some people have the idea to have to pay attention to you no matter what. It's even better when you're good at whatever you're doing, because then you've got strangers (read: girls on the bleachers) who pay attention to you, too. And then, when you're surrounded by a bunch of pretty boys, those strangers are deluded into thinking that <em>you're<em> a pretty boy (although this may be partially due to his pink hair; you don't usually see people walking around with pink hair). But you're not just a bunch of pretty boys—you're a bunch of pretty boys playing _tennis_. By then, you've got all kinds of people screaming your name, and you still haven't really done anything to really stand out.

Sometimes, Marui is humble enough to try and not let the fame get to his head.

"Do you hear those girls screaming my name?" he asks Jackal randomly in the middle of a practice doubles match.

Jackal scrunches his eyebrows and turns around very slowly to face him. "…No," Jackal says finally, unsure of whether playing along is a good idea or not. As he does, a tennis ball whizzes past them both. Jackal jumps, concentration scattered.

Marui whistles. "Yeah. I don't, either."

Sometimes, the fame makes its way there anyway.

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Other times, it doesn't.

Marui can understand, though. Sometimes they are good reasons to why people do bad things. So when Marui actually does make it as a regular in his second year of high school, it's not as though he doesn't expect it. His newly-purchased stick of gum mysteriously disappears from his locker. Jackal's razor is gone, too, along with Yagyuu's grip tape and Niou's hair tie.

But gum can be replaced. Yagyuu has more than one roll of grip tape, and Niou keeps most of his hair ties at home.

Marui is there when Jackal marches up to senpai and, as politely as he can, asks if they have seen his razor.

"Razor? We don't know anything about a razor."

Jackal drops his gaze and bows. "Excuse me." He makes to leave, when one of them calls him back.

"Kuwahara."

Jackal turns around.

One of the older boys tosses something onto the floor. The razor skids across the floor and knocks into Marui's shoes.

"There. You can have that back."

Jackal's face is dark. He is angry, but these boys have power over him. He clenches his fists.

"Oh, it still works."

The buzzing noise cuts through the tension. Marui's picked the razor up and is holding it out in front of him at eye-level. He thrusts it out in Jackal's direction so he can see it better. "See?" He flicks it off, and the buzzing stops.

They're all staring at him strangely, as if he'd just said something ridiculous. He probably has, but Marui's half-functioning brain isn't very good at catching on. He walks over to Jackal, opens his fist for him, and drops the razor into his grasp. The weight is familiar in Jackal's hand, reassuring.

"I don't know how you dare."

Someone is speaking to him. Marui turns to his senpai, startled. "Hm?"

"What right do you think you have, huh?" The tallest one takes two steps forward, gaze boring into him from above. It's a little unnerving, and Marui leans back to look up. "You think that now that it's a new year and the captain's changed that your behaviour is acceptable?"

"I was helping you give his razor back."

"What a joke!" Senpai laughs. "Those regular positions, you know why you got them? It's a popularity contest. You're nothing. None of you are good at tennis. That Yukimura? He's only captain because of his looks. You're only second years! You don't know anything."

Marui's eyes narrow. "Well, what do you know?"

"_What_?"

"You've lived longer than us by one year, big deal. Sanada took care of your ego yesterday, have you forgotten already? He's younger than you too, why aren't you picking on him?"

Jackal puts one hand on Marui's shoulder. A warning. But he doesn't stop him. Even more reason to keep going.

"Though I think Akaya's put your ego out of commission permanently. You should've seen your own face when he went Devil Mode on you. Now that was a show."

Senpai is shocked speechless. Jackal's moved his hand from Marui's shoulder and he's hissing in his ear, 'damn it Marui, you went too far.'

Marui supposes he did, but it takes a few more seconds for the other half of his brain to shift into gear. When it does, Marui's eyes widen and his tongue stills, every nerve in his body telling him that he's done something very, very bad.

Acting almost purely on instinct, he turns for the door and walks out of the change room. He begins to run. Keeps running and running until his lungs burn more than his face does.

His legs take him to the first empty classroom on the second floor and as soon as he's in, he slides the door shut behind him and collapses in the corner, folding his arms over his knees. He's still in his uniform, he realizes, as he puts a hand to his forehead. He hasn't even wiped his sweat off yet. He reaches for some chewing gum in his pocket before he remembers that it's gone, and he shuts his eyes, wedges himself in the corner, and tries to shrink into it.

He's still crouched there half an hour later even after his breathing's steadied. "It's not my fault," he says to himself, trying to find the energy to stand up. "It's not my fault."

"What isn't?"

When Marui looks up, there are a pair of eyes so close to his own that their eyelashes might have brushed if they blinked at the same time. Marui pulls back, startled, and realizes that this is a face he sort of recognizes. "Oh," he says.

Nameless waves. "Jackal-kun asked me to help him 'go find a pink head'," she explains. She shuffles a little and leans her back against the wall so that she's next to him. She was closer than necessary. Marui shifts away, slightly uncomfortable.

"What happened?"

"Ask Jackal. Or one of the tennis club members," Marui says, only noticing how bitter he sounds when he speaks. "They'll talk up storms, I'm sure."

"I asked you, though. You didn't get into a fight with Jackal-kun, did you?"

"No." Marui isn't super-close, bath-taking buddies with Jackal. Marui just relies on Jackal to clean his messes up for him sometimes. Other times, Marui will invite himself over to Jackal's house and do absolutely nothing. And besides, they're doubles partners; they probably understand each other better than anyone on the court. Even off the court, too. Jackal is a lot of things—so many things that there probably doesn't exist a word in the world that can describe the dynamic between them as accurately as Marui would like. And even then, Marui isn't sure it would be enough.

"Oh, okay. That's good," she says.

Marui buries his chin between his knees. "It's just not my fault."

Nameless taps her chin thoughtfully. "I've got an idea," she says, clapping her hands together. "We can play rock-paper-scissors to see whose fault it is."

Marui didn't expect much from her little idea, but this is just stupid. And he tells her so. "This is stupid," he says, frowning. "How is this supposed to solve anything?"

"Well, if it isn't your fault and it isn't my fault, then it doesn't matter whose fault it really is. We can just put an end to it." The grin she was sporting on her face softs into a smile that curves gently around her features. "Now. Rock, paper…"

She wiggles her fingers behind her back to make sure Marui can see her open palm, and in the second before she finishes her sentence, Marui decides that as much as he enjoys being contrary, he isn't one to throw stones at a hand stretched out to help him.

The pair of scissors Marui plays are too blunt, not meant to cut. She slots her hand between the two blades in full faith that they would not harm her. From that position, she uses this opportunity to grab his index finger and shake it up and down like a strange, unplanned special handshake.

"Maaan, I lost. I guess it's my fault, then!" Her expression doesn't match at all with the words coming out of her mouth.

Marui plays along and chuckles. "Better go apologize to senpai, then."

She doesn't let go of his finger. "Let's find Jackal-kun first," she suggests, smiling cheekily.

.

Jackal is standing outside the club room when they find him.

"Can you please use at least a fourth of your hearing ability to listen to yourself when you're speaking?" he asks Marui, and tosses a new pack of gum at his head. "Or at least think before you talk? I don't understand how anyone puts up with you."

"Is that something you say to the person who found your razor for you?" Marui says, frowning. "Rude."

"I'm not blaming you. You could have handled that better, though." Jackal sighs. "I apologized to them for you. Even if they started it, you've still got to show your senpai respect."

"You weren't even really a part of this," Marui says, scowling. "Why do _you_ have to apologize?"

"I happen to be a part of everything that involves you."

_But you are not a burden_. Marui swallows his angry words down his throat and looks down. Next to him, Nameless smiles. Only then does Jackal seem to notice her.

"Thanks for finding him, Igarashi."

Marui looks back up. He doesn't know this name. "Igarashi?" he asks.

Jackal jabs a thumb in Nameless' direction. "Igarashi."

"Igarashi," Marui repeats, squinting in her direction.

'Igarashi' nods. Waves. "Igarashi," she confirms.

"Oh," is all Marui says.

Igarashi shrugs and folds her hands together. "Well, I don't blame you. Names are hardly important."

"It's enough if I remember though, right?"

Igarashi laughs. "Just don't forget."

She leaves first, running off to catch the bus. Jackal waits for Marui to finish changing before he passes him his bag. Marui takes it and marches towards the school gates, whistling cheerily to himself. "Is this the part where we skip into the sunset?" he asks Jackal.

"What—no," Jackal says.

"Did you end up finding the grip tape?"

"Yeah."

"Hair tie?"

"Niou told me to forget about it. It's only a hair tie." Jackal sighs. "You know, it's hard to blame senpai for saying what he did."

"Hmm."

"They're in their third year, you know."

"Mhmm."

"Club activities won't last long for them."

"I know."

There are people who take advantage of being pitied, Marui knows this. The thing about growing up is that you'll think you're old. But you haven't really grown up until one day you walk past dandelions without picking them, or step on three different cracks in the sidewalk, without remembering that there is something you should be regretting.

Jackal watches Marui hopscotch halfway home and stops walking to watch a car pass them by.

"You know, Jackal."

"What?"

"You know some really weird people."

"Do I?"

"That girl."

"Oh, Igarashi. She's… well, yes." Pause. "But now you know her, too."

"…Yeah." Hop. Skip. Jump. "I guess I do."

The rest of the walk home is quiet.

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End file.
